"Two men walking through a field." - from 'Through the express window' project.

The faster the trains go and the more we look into laptops, cell phones and tablets the less we see what's around us through the window. Sometimes we might miss on situations or moments that are interesting and tell us something more about the culture of a place were going through. I decided to validate this hypothesis with an experiment of shooting with a camera out of a speeding train when on route from Lviv to Kyiv. Contrary to the weather that day (beautiful, sunny, blue sky) the photographs were processed to black & white creating a rather sorrowful, slash, sad pictures. You can do anything nowadays, can't you? Still, experimenting in the digital darkroom and being reluctant at first, I pushed the boundaries and tried to discover something different in the shots I captured. The effects you can see below.

LVIV / A woman with an umbrella strolling during the rainy weather next to a Lada car.Lada's are a frequent sight in Lviv. This Russian car is widely used yet giving space to more modern constructions. In general streets are not overrun by cars or public transport. It's fair to say that people mainly use their feet or public transport (eg. trams and marshrutkas).

Streets made of cobblestone, trams taken from another century and Lada's taken from Russia. These are not the only things you will notice when in Lviv, Ukraine. This not-so-small (over 700 000 inhabitants) yet kind of "cozy" city on the far West of the Ukraine is a charming place to visit. The decline of Hryvnia (country's currency) has made this city exceptionally affordable for the Western travellers yet also influencing a decline the Ukraine's economy. Lviv is a place that you will want to visit again and again and let me tell you why.